Can you get an STD if you and your partner are virgins?

Answer 1

It's possible to get some STDs without having vaginal sex. The word "virgin" has no medical meaning, so I can't tell if you or your partner may have had oral/genital sex, or genital/genital contact, or anal sex that might put you at risk for infection.

STDs can be transmitted between people who have engaged in pretty much ANY sort of sexual activity: kissing, fondling, genital contact, or intercourse. Obviously, the risks of transmission vary according to the type of activity and precautions being taken, but there is no requirement that intercourse (either vaginal or anal) take place for a person to contract an STD.

In addition, it's possible to spread the herpes virus via oral sex even if you've never had any sexual contact with another partner.

Some STDs are passed to a baby before or during birth. Some of these STDs are also, unfortunately, asymptomatic (meaning that they show no symptoms for some cases). However, it would be highly unusual for normal childhood medical care to not detect these inborn STD, so only those who never had medical checkups during childhood would have an undetected STD.

Some infections which can be transmitted during sexual intercourse may be caught initially by other means - many are blood-borne, and any activity in which an individual could come into contact with infected blood will transmit the STD. E.g. the transfer of infected blood during blood transfusion, intravenous drug use / sharing of needles, or non-sterile tattooing equipment / needles. HIV/AIDS, Herpes, and Hepatitis are the most common blood-borne STDs. Casual contact with another person's blood (e.g. while giving first aid) is extraordinarily unlikely to be sufficient to transmit a STD, but those working in the medical fields (particularly those dealing with trauma cause, with large open wounds on a regular basis, such as ER or EMT personnel) do run a serious risk.

A few have other transmission vectors - physical contact of any kind (HPV), physical contact with infected sites (HSV) potentially from contaminated foods (Hepatitis A). As such even though you are both virgins there is a chance that you may already be carrying an infection.

Before having sexual contact, talk to your health care provider about STDs and how they are spread. Then you can make informed decisions about how to be safe.

The only way to be absolutely sure that you and your partner are not carrying an infection / disease that could potentially be transmitted during sex is to go and be tested by a doctor or your local health clinic. Note that many STDs have an incubation period, usually a short time after initial infection, where a test cannot detect the presence of that STD. So having tests immediately after possible infection are not entirely reliable - generally, testing a month after last sexual experience is more reliable, though talk to a doctor to find out the exact reliability of all tests.

With both partners being virgins, the chances that one of you has an STD are less than the general population at large, but that's NOT a good gamble to take. So don't make any assumptions about virginity equating to STD-free.

It is also strongly suggested that you always use some form of barrier contraceptive such as condoms during sex; as well as greatly reducing the risk of contracting a sexually transmitted infection, they also reduce the risk of unwanted pregnancy.

For more information on the risks of contracting STIs from varying sexual activities, please see the related link from the UK National Health Service.